Science Library Pad

more on library futures from NFAIS and Australia

UBC Google Scholar blog has an interview with Peter Morville about his book Ambient Findability.
(My general comment: interesting book, but the themes were a bit unfocussed.)

At the end I noticed a link to Libraries Embracing Change, which turns out to be blogging of an NFAIS 2006 session by Marydee (who has the amazing ability to construct entire coherent paragraphs while watching a presentation, whereas I can barely cobble together some point-form notes).

It has some very interesting points, the most striking being:

The view of special libraries was presented by Melanie O'Neill, VP R&D Information, GlaxoSmithKline. Her main theme was managing information for the discovery and development of new medicines. GSK has a very mobile workforce and has closed physical libraries to create a virtual library.

GSK negotiated enterprisewide contracts to put information on the desktop. It's no longer OK for a scientist to ask a librarian a question that can be answered at the desktop by resources purchased by the information department. On the GSK library portal, scientists are encouraged to use Google and Google Scholar. I'm rather shocked by that and, in answer to a question from the audience, O'Neill said it was very popular and heavily used.

This is much as I've been indicating previously: it's not just theory that the physical research library can be replaced with licenses to online content and search tools.  I'm not saying this is right, I'm saying it's reality.

I'm chopping up Marydee's post a bit, but here are two other important pieces:

Librarians have done a lousy job of communicating our value proposition, letting search engines grab mindshare, we need to learn how to do what we do better. End the priesthood of librarianship

...

[GSK] librarians are now analyzing information and are situated within project/strategy teams. There's a major push to capture and manage proprietary information (e-lab books, e-archiving, records retention). She wants to blur the distinction between publicly published data and proprietary information, and mine proprietary data in same fashion as searching public sources. Breaking down the silos between libraries and archives is the goal.

Marydee also has another posting from the same track, Information Companies Embracing Change

Kevin Bouley, CEO of NERAC, then gave his own case study of transforming a company that looked like it was doing just fine. That's harder. He hired a consultant to help them be innovative, but the staff was unable to grasp change. "Our minds had calcified. Ideas generated by staff weren't innovative."

He tried again a year later with more success. NERAC evolved from search and content to research solutions, It added opinion to research and took on a more analytical role. It began to focus on the customer not the product.

The NFAIS 2006 program looks like it had a lot of great material, slides are linked inline with each day's listing of presentations.  The Embracing Change ones are from February 28, 2006.  The specific GSK presentation is Managing information for discovery and development of new medicines (PowerPoint).

UPDATE 2006-03-13: I'm told that the bulk of the NFAIS presentations are now up on the sub-pages available under http://www.nfais.org/2006_Tier_Program.htm

Incidentally, NERAC has a blog.

Today I also happened to be scanning the Australian ALIA "blog", and came across a posting Libraries for the future (I can't link to it because there are no permalinks... or comments... so not really a blog).

Charles Leadbeater says that institutions that are 'stuck' are in a chronic condition and which are then very prone to crisis. He suggested that librarians are 'stuck' and could continue to stay in this category if action is not taken. Libraries and librarians need to articulate their role in creating a creative society.

The quote of the day came during question time of the first speaker, Joel Kotkin. When asked if libraries are going to be like the Mail Coach (now defunct) ...He replied that 'Libraries should be in the wisdom business'.

The event was Library of the 21st Century Symposium.

In an interesting twist, there are no PowerPointy presentations available, but there are MP3 audio files and text transcripts, or you can subscribe to the podcast feed at http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/about/site/feeds/podcast_slv21.xml

Previously:
January 10, 2005  the fall of the temple of books
December 14, 2005  it is easiest to discover what is everywhere: Ambient Findability

The Onion Reports: Street-Smart Teen Dies In Library

Onion Radio News: Street-Smart Teen Dies In Library

dialogue on role of media in global society

copied from Towards the Information Ecology

On Wednesday Feb. 22nd [Univeristy of Guelph] President Alastair Summerlee hosted the inaugural President's Dialogue on the role of the media in a changing global community.

It consisted of a stellar panel of experts and pundits engaged in a wide ranging discussion about many aspects of the media. The panel included:

Arthur Carty, National Science Advisor to the Prime Minister
Gwynne Dyer, freelance journalist
Scott Griffin, founder of the Griffin Prize for poetry
Michael MacMillan, CEO Alliance Atlantis
John McMurtry, philosopher and professor
Stephen Strauss, science journalist
Marci McDonald, freelance journalist

This is a very informed group with widely (and wildly) divergent ideas. You certainly won't agree with everything but I think you will be engaged and probably provoked.

The site contains a streamed video and audio version of the disussion

Nature on Google Earth

Or is that Google Earth, on Nature?

Nature's Nascent blog reports                              

Nature's own Declan Butler reports on a great collection of articles that he helped to put together:

This week's issue contains several pieces on virtual globes, and all are on free access. I've written a three-page feature — Virtual globes: The web-wide world — on the various ways scientists are beginning to use virtual globes, such as Google Earth and Nasa's World Wind.

I discuss the feature in an accompanying podcast.

...

There is also a two-page Commentary — “Mapping disaster zones” — on the use of Google Earth in humanitarian disasters.

...

Nature itself has its lead editorial — Think Global

...

I also collected an extensive collection of bookmarks to various great resources on GIS, science, and virtual globes during the research; I will upload all of these to my GIS tag on Connotea

Read more at Declan's blog.

I've been tracking these sorts of things in my blog Mapping category.  (If you want science-specific mapping, you'll have to intersect the science and mapping categories, which currently Typepad can't do for you.) 

For my bookmarks, check http://www.furl.net/members/rakerman/Mapping
(I don't know if you can intersect categories in Furl, anyone?)

Also see my September 17, 2005 posting Google Earth: You say you want a Revolution?

Nature's own Declan Butler reports on a great collection of articles that he helped to put together:

This week's issue contains several pieces on virtual globes, and all are on free access. I've written a three-page feature — Virtual globes: The web-wide world — on the various ways scientists are beginning to use virtual globes, such as Google Earth and Nasa's World Wind.

I discuss the feature in an accompanying podcast.

...

There is also a two-page Commentary — “Mapping disaster zones” — on the use of Google Earth in humanitarian disasters.

...

Nature itself has its lead editorial — Think Global

...

I also collected an extensive collection of bookmarks to various great resources on GIS, science, and virtual globes during the research; I will upload all of these to my GIS tag on Connotea

Read more at Declan's blog.

I've been tracking these sorts of things in my blog Mapping category.  (If you want science-specific mapping, you'll have to intersect the science and mapping categories, which currently Typepad can't do for you.) 

For my bookmarks, check http://www.furl.net/members/rakerman/Mapping
(I don't know if you can intersect categories in Furl, anyone?)

Also see my September 17, 2005 posting Google Earth: You say you want a Revolution?

UK library stats: visits up, book lending down

While visits to public libraries increased by over three million last year, statistics released today show that the number of active borrowers and the number of books issued continue to fall.

Figures from the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy showed that in 2004/05, visits to public libraries rose for the third year running, with the number of visits up by a total of 17m since 2001/02. However, the fact that the number of books borrowed is on the decline appears to suggest that visitors are using their local libraries for research or for multimedia facilities rather than for their traditional purpose of book lending. Commenting on the findings, John Dolan, head of library policy at the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), said: "These figures are a welcome spotlight on library performance and their timely release means that public libraries services can start the year knowing that more people are visiting and also with a clear set of goals for the future.

Guardian Latest statistics show mixed fortunes for libraries January 4, 2006

There is also a report in the January 2006 Guardian Public magazine, but I don't think it will be online for a couple months: Dusting off the cobwebs

Mark Wood and Chris Batt know that their museums, libraries and archives must change in line with technology and taste. Sophie Elmhirst finds them hungry for the brave new world

Libraries have been the source of some unlikely controversy in recent months. The news that these venerable public institutions have let their book stocks dwindle and buildings suffer, and that book lending is diminishing, has caused upset. A report published in March 2005 by the Commons' committee on culture, media and sport found 50% of library services to be "persistently below standard". It can't have been pretty reading for Mark Wood and Chris Batt, chair and chief executive of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA).

First report via self-confessed "library geek" Nora Young on this morning's CBC Radio Two
Music and Company.  She had high praise actually for online library technology.

Nora Young also podcasts with Cathi Bond at thesniffer (via odeo.com, after a couple of clicks).

life sciences mag The Scientist now has blogs, podcasts

The folks at the excellent life sciences-centric magazine The Scientist launched a spiffy redesign today. It's a nice piece of work, complete with podcasts, blogs, and the rest. But what's really cool is that for the next week the whole publication is free, including the archives

via Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed: The Scientist, 2.0

On the new site, they state

As our way of saying thank you for visiting The Scientist's redesigned website, we're making every area of the site free until January 10th [2006]. Enjoy access to over 20 years of archived information and a host of fresh, exciting new web features, at no cost.

The blogs can be found at http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/ as linked above, and they actually go back to June 2005.

Previously:
August 26, 2005  life science blogging

'tis the season for Gartner 2006 technology foresight

Gartner is out with various suggestions and predictions for 2006.  (Note: good luck trying to find info on many of these on the Gartner site itself.)

Stephen Abram's Lighthouse illuminates the way to Gartner's list of CIO resolutions for 2006.

rediff.com gives the details of the three strategic groupings that were identified in the resolutions:

Theme #1: Choose 2006 tactics towards a 2008 strategy.

Many of the challenges that businesses will face in 2006 will take years to accomplish.

Mainstream availability of service-oriented software, virtualised infrastructure facilities and the rising penetration of consumer devices into business environments are just a few examples that mark the start of the most extensive and complex legacy migration that IT organisations and the IT industry have yet to undertake.

...

Theme #2: Insist on agility - in the heart of the organisation.

The need to focus on agility and resilience has never been greater as businesses continue to embrace opportunities and deal with uncertain trading conditions. CIOs should consider their public profile and engage in activities such as public speaking, which can help with perception of the brand, visibility of IT's contribution to the firm and the CIO's own credibility.

Business skills will be in short supply in the IT organisation and CIOs should consider handpicking business people to join the organisation. They should also create at least one direct report position without portfolio to lead change as the roles, organisation, infrastructure and sourcing of IT all begin to transform.

...

Theme #3: Push beyond 2005 comfort zones - in value focus and technology.

As IT organisations transition their value contribution towards business processes, information and relationships, the opportunity exists to refocus on the design and management of business process and relationships. However, there are significant barriers to credibility, skills and understanding.

2006 is the year to start expanding the boundaries of value that CIOs can deliver. CIOs should begin by building a solid partnership with the CFO -- a power-player worth cultivating.

But Gartner's list of n@ughty and nice is not yet done by a long shot: next up is their 2006 Top 10 Strategic Technologies.  TechTarget reports they include:

Virtualization, Grid computing,

Service-oriented business applications (SOBAs). This next generation of software is built on a service-oriented architecture (SOA) and incorporates Web services standards, such as Business Process Execution Language, Simple Object Access Protocol and Web Services Description Language.

Pervasive computing,

OLED/LEP technologies. Organic Light Emitting Diode and light emitting polymer are set to revolutionize the display industry. They don't require a backlight, and are more energy efficient and offer a higher contrast that traditional LCD displays.

Location-aware services, Linux -- for important stuff,

Desktop search tools. Google has one, and Microsoft is building it into future versions of its desktop operating system. "Enterprises need to select a default search tool and use it to target the user constituency that can benefit from it," [Analyst Carl] Claunch said.

Microcommerce. Consumer-facing organizations should think about ways to offer low-cost items because the infrastructure has emerged to handle micropayments.

Finally, instant messaging. It's not new, but it's displacing other technologies, such as Voice over Internet Protocol, in some cases. At Gartner, for example, phone calls among the firm's worldwide network of analysts have declined 75% since they began using it, Claunch said.

and just to round things out, Gartner has also issued predictions for 2006.

Many of their predictions you have to pay to read, but you can listen to an assortment of Gartner Voice podcasts on various areas, and also they have put up a Gartner Predicts 2006 blog where you can read some of the predictions and comment.

New TypePad features

You can now insert an RSS feed directly into your sidebar, without having to turn it into JavaScript or anything.

In Weblogs -> Design -> Edit -> Content Selections there is now an option "Feeds".

You can read the overview of the new features, which came from an intensive one-day hacking session.
Unfortunately the list of new features is not linked to info about each one.
They have also added support for publishing your podcasts.

I just noticed, they have also added my requested feature: you can now send trackbacks to any addresses you want, directly from within the "New Post" interface (no more sending a single trackback from TypePad QuickPost).

Previously:
2005-July-17  ways to generate a linkblog display
2005-March-31  sending trackbacks from TypePad basic

Apple iTunes 4.9 with podcasting support

The banner on Apple.com today is "Introducing iTunes with Podcasting.  Radio Reborn.  Subscribe to thousands of radio shows and sync them to your iPod." 

I suppose it doesn't hurt that the coinage "podcasting" reinforces their brand.

You can grab the new software for Mac and Windows from http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/

There is also a new page http://www.apple.com/podcasting/

Via Slashdot /.

podcasting in the mainstream media

How quickly does new technology move from technophile fringe to the mainstream?

Well, all I can tell you is that BusinessWeek is following up their cover story on blogs by starting podcasting on May 23.

Forbes also had a recent article Podcasting: Making Waves.

Alberta Scene Radio podcast

Alberta Scene is a big set of events in Ottawa celebrating Alberta culture.
One promotion tool they are using is Alberta Scene Radio, which is available as a podcast:

http://albertascene.ca/rss/albertascene.xml

audio and video RSS aggregator for MacOS X

ANT is an RSS video aggregator and media player currently available for Mac OS X 10.3 Panther.

With ANT, you can subscribe to any RSS 2.0 feed with enclosures. ANT will automatically download fresh audio and video content for you to watch and listen to. It can playback any media format, and syncs audio files with iTunes so you can easily add them to your portable MP3 player.

www.AntIsNotTV.net

via Macintouch

CBC on podcasting?

There was a brief news bite about music on iPods in the CBC Radio news this morning.
They said there will be a report on the World at Six tonight on how the iPod is impacting radio, which will presumably be a report on podcasting.

UPDATE: The report by Derek Stoffel aired about 24 minutes into the broadcast.  In the intro they mentioned that CBC Radio is podcasting, but the report talked only about personal podcasting.  Jonathan McKinnell may be the most famous podcaster in Canada right now, as he was the only one they mentioned.  The story also mentioned the latest Pew Internet Project report on Podcasting, which gives what I think is an improbably high number for podcast downloading:

More than 22 million American adults own iPods or MP3 players and 29% of them have downloaded podcasts from the Web so that they could listen to audio files at a time of their choosing.

You can listen to the latest World at Six with RealPlayer at http://www.cbc.ca/w6/audio.html, in the window of availability for today's broadcast (they are still providing Friday's).

podcasting and hype

I guess I am curmudgeonly in my old age.
I've been doing Internet audio, photos, telephony, video for like a decade.
So I am not so clear about all this IM, podcasting, Skype hype.

Anyway, maybe it's all more wonderful than ever before.
Darren Barefoot is dubious about podcasting.

I guess my main issue is: who has this much attention.
You're going to read your 100 RSS feeds AND listen to a dozen podcasts AND watch some videoblogging AND answer some IM requests AND chat over Skype AND watch some screencasts, webcasts, ... ?

I'm not saying that all these technologies don't all add some small useful additions to the technoverse.

podcast jukebox

Podcast Jukebox @ Search 4 RSS

tracking podcasts with Bloglines

Once you subscribe to a podcast feed in Bloglines, it will be added to your personal My Feeds list. When a new podcast is available, you�ll see the alert next to that feed. Each podcast update has a text note accompanied by an �enclosure� icon that links to the audio podcast file. Simply click on that enclosure link to start the podcast. That will launch your desktop media player or specialized podcasting software ..., and the podcast of your choice will play right from Bloglines.

from Open Stacks: Bloglines gets hip to podcasting

This is handy for me since most of the new podcasting software doesn't run on my older version of MacOS X.

Globe on podcasting

Have you ever wished you could download your favourite radio program and listen to it later, perhaps while making dinner or the next morning on your drive to work? Have you ever wished you even had a favourite radio program, one that specialized in snowmobiling, say, or Canadian tax law?

No matter how narrow your niche interest or how peculiar your audio wish, it's probably already come true thanks to brand-new software that is storming the Internet and sparking a renaissance in radio.

The concept is called podcasting.

from the Globe and Mail Radio blogs get great reception
via Dysart & Jones

I still don't exactly get what's so hot about podcasting since you could already, for years, download MP3s or listen to streaming radio.  But apparently the tiny layer of automation / notification that podcasting adds on top of this has got everyone hot hot hot.

Internet Audio: Can You Hear Me Now?

Library Web Chic points to a preview of some of the audio interviews that will be featured for the Spring 2005 mcli Forum article on Internet Audio

Blogging about blogging is old hat.  Podcasting about podcasting is where it's at.

Select individual interviews (MP3) from www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/forum/spr05/podcast.html
or suck up the podcast from www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/forum/spr05/podcast.xml

from Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction (mcli)

Radio-Canada podcasting / baladodiffusion

On the heels of the English-language CBC Radio podcasts, Radio-Canada's Le Carnet Techo has a couple posts about French-language podcasting.

Le carnet Techno inaugure le projet pilote de baladodiffusion (podcasting) de la Première Chaîne de Radio-Canada. 

Pour ce premier volet, je vous suggère un rendez-vous hebdomadaire qui traitera de l'actualité techno de la semaine. Cette première édition est courte, 3 minutes, je vous promets quelque chose de plus long la semaine prochaine... si vous le désirez évidemment ;-)

www.radio-canada.ca/baladodiffusion/
rss.radio-canada.ca/revuetechno.xml

D'abord le site de Bertrand Lenotre qui présente l'émission Le Podcasteur. Un magazine produit à partir de chez lui, qui traite de l'actualité de la blogosphère et de la baladodiffusion.
...
Deuxième arrêt, le site du journaliste Benoît Bisson. Celui-ci offre un segment hebdomadaire en baladodiffusion depuis plusieurs semaines.

Ok, I give in, I'm going to make a podcasting category.
So far all of the Mac clients that I can find require OS X 10.3 or better, grr.
I'm waiting to jump from 10.2 directly to 10.4

Note: You can also just listen to the latest show in MP3 or (yuck) WMA format, e.g.
www.radio-canada.ca/radio/techno/telechargement/revuetechno0318.mp3

IT Conversations audio

IT Conversations has tons of audio about all sorts of IT topics.  Of particular interest to this audience may be Search is a Platform.  Where is it Going?

And yes, they have RSS feeds and podcasts.

CBC Radio podcasting

I'm going to be upfront: I had audio on the net something like 10 years ago.
Back in the day, you had to make everything into Sun format .au files as I recall.
Anyway, so having audio inside of RSS I guess is... nice, but I don't entirely get the big deal.
Audio: good.  Packaging: whatever.

Anyway, with that out of the way, CBC Radio is going to start podcasting.
Todd Maffin, everyone's favorite techno-enthusiast radio guy, reports it:
CBC Radio Begins Podcasting

via Darren Barefoot

UPDATE: You can also go directly to www.cbc.ca/podcasting/

Battlestar Galactica commentary podcast

Not only can you view the entire first episode of Battlestar Galactica online for free, you can now download a weekly podcast of running audio commentary from Ron Moore, to listen to as the episode unfolds.

via Slashdot Galactica Commentary Podcast Available /.

feedster.tv - the new tv dinner

Feedster.tv :: Rich media feeds for your aggregator

MP3 audio, video, BitTorrents, pictures

Is this the first search engine to have a radio button to search for podcasts?

Previously:
Google video search
video search

tivo that net radio

BlogMatrix Sparks (NOTE: Windows only.)

Use BlogMatrix Sparks! to record streaming Internet radio programs and download podcasts and store them in your media player (iTunes or Windows Media Player).

Via Slashdot Realtime Audio Conversion And Serving /.

(Incidentally this is my 100th post.)

advanced uses of RSS

RSS audio casting ("podcasting") is already being used.
Next up, additional media types.
Yahoo is developing Media RSS.
Now if I read this right, basically what's happening is in the absence of XML standards for publishing/notifying about multimedia content, RSS is being leveraged to create these kinds of information streams.

Yahoo Media RSS link via SearchEngineWatch.

UPDATE 2004-12-24: You can use FeedBurner SmartCast to turn regular postings into podcasts, if you don't have the ability or desire to build up RSS 2.0 feeds yourself.  You can get more info from Easier Podcasting with SmartCast.